And the battleflags were furl'd
by silverbirch
Summary: Wars are fought by heroes, to make a better world. Aren't they? But if war is the defining moment of your life, what happens to the rest of it? Some will struggle to live the peace their sacrifice deserves. A one shot about two people.


This is a one-shot written for imdeadsothere's Thunderstorm Romance Challenge at .net/topic/44309/15496112/1/

The title and quotes are from "Loxley Hall" and "Locksley Hall Sixty Years After" by Alfred Tennyson.

* * *

Sundays were the worse. During the week he could bury himself in Hogwarts and work with Professor Sprout. He volunteered for everything; watering, weeding, re-potting – anything that would keep him busy from waking until it was time to fall exhausted into bed.

_Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers, and he bears a laden breast,_

_Full of sad experience, moving toward the stillness of his rest._

On Saturday he would return to his Grandmother's house and help her with the shopping and cleaning and anything else she needed doing. Life there was better for him than it used to be. He had earned her respect in the war, and she now treated him as being worthy of carrying the name Longbottom. His Order of Merlin took central position on the mantelpiece in the living room, and he suspected that she polished it every day.

He had been a hero, once. He had reformed Dumbledore's Army and led the resistance in Hogwarts School. He had fought in that last battle and killed Voldemort's snake. He had brandished the Sword as a true Gryffindor.

Now he worked in a greenhouse, or at his Grandmother's, and tried not to think about Sundays.

_Make me feel the wild pulsation that I felt before the strife,_

_W__hen I heard my days before me, and the tumult of my life;_

On Sunday they would rise and breakfast at ten o'clock. They would have dinner at seven. In between he would visit his parents at St Mungo's Hospital, where they had existed for over twenty years.

Neville visited them every Sunday and stayed for an hour. They did not know, and would never know, who he was. He never spoke to them, but would just sit and smile and accept the things his mother gave him. He used to collect them, once, but now put them in a rubbish bin once he left the hospital.

Then he would walk, until it was time to go home for his dinner. He walked because it was better than standing still. He walked because that was all there was to do on a Sunday afternoon in Diagon Alley. Everything was closed and he didn't look in the shop windows anymore because they never changed, and he knew them all by heart.

Only Weasley's Wizard Wheezes caught his eye in passing. But he would not stop to look, nor would he have gone in if it were open. He couldn't have brought himself to do it because Neville Longbottom hated Molly Weasley with a passion.

She had killed Bellatrix Lestrange. Killed her and given her the escape his parents had never had. She was at rest, they were not, and it was Molly Weasley's fault. He wanted Lestrange to live, so that he could have avenged his parents by making her suffer as they had.

_Am I mad, that I should cherish that which bears but bitter fruit?_

_I will pluck it from my bosom, tho' my heart be at the root._

There were still three hours until dinner, and the lowering sky threatened rain.

-o0o-

Sundays were the worse. During the week, and on Saturdays, she could bury herself in work. She worked every shift at The Leaky Cauldron and, in the quiet hours between Lunch and Dinner, would clean. Tom was pleased to have such a willing worker, and his pub looked smarter than it had for years.

She had been young, once, and had set off for Hogwarts School with great joy. She was entering her mother's world and all would be wonderful.

_Hope was ever on her mountain, watching till the day begun _

_Crown'd with sunlight -- over darkness -- from the still unrisen sun._

They had come for her, one day, to tell her that her mother was dead. She had been killed for marrying a Muggle. They had left her father alive so that he could live with his guilt. They had told him that she was dead because of him. Hannah had not been allowed to see her mother's body before the burial.

He sat and brooded over pictures of his wife, but only Muggle ones. He would have nothing magical in the house. He had not wanted her to return to Hogwarts. He wanted her to give up magic and remain in his world. He never accompanied her to King's Cross again.

She had stayed on for her seventh year, despite everything, because the other option was to go home. She had fought in the battle because, had she not, she would never have been able to return to the magical world again.

She had fought, and become a hero along with everyone else. They had given her a medal to prove it. It was still at her father's house, she thought. She hadn't been able to put it on display, even if she'd wanted to.

After it was all over and the dead had been buried she had gone home, to watch her father brood over Muggle photos. She had tried to reorganise her life; to plan her career and be a dutiful daughter. Then one day she had used _Reparo_ on a broken glass and he had flown at her in a rage. He had said that magic was "Dancing on her Mother's grave" and she was never to use it again.

Hannah Abbot apparated out of the house and had never gone back. His world was not hers, and never could be.

_Cast the poison from your bosom, oust the madness from your brain._

_Let the trampled serpent show you that you have not lived in vain._

Now she worked as a barmaid and saved her galleons. One day she would have enough to be her own Mistress. Sunday was the only time she had off, because Tom insisted on it. He would close the bar promptly at two and not open it again until seven. He was adamant that no work would be done between those hours, and that she should go of to enjoy herself.

So she walked Diagon Alley and counted down the 300 minutes, 18000 seconds, until she could do something. Serving butterbeers and firewhiskey was better than nothing, until she could have a life again.

_Fires that shook me once, but now to silent ashes fall'n away._

_Cold upon the dead volcano sleeps the gleam of dying day._

There were still three hours to go until she could return when the first flash of lightening seared the sky. She hated lightening. It reminded her of the flashes of killing curses. The rumble of thunder rolled across the sky. It was low pitched, like moaning. Like the sound of wounded calling out in the dark.

Friend or foe had all sounded the same when they were dying.

Another flash rent the sky and large raindrops fell, making a plopping noise as they hit the cobbles. She would need shelter and protection for 180 minutes, 10800 seconds.

-o0o-

He ducked into a doorway, seeking shelter from the approaching storm. It made no difference; he would stand instead of walk. He would wait until the appointed time before returning to his Grandmother. She observed Sunday afternoons as a time of rest. She did not approve of reading, or music.

Through the sound of water falling came a new note, the rhythmic _splash splash_ of feet in puddles. Another lost soul was out, for no real reason apart from having to be somewhere on a Sunday afternoon.

Hannah ducked into the shelter and shook the rain from the hood of her robe before flinging it back from her head. She ran fingers through blond hair before shaking it loose. Only then did she notice that another shared her sanctuary. A man, pressed into a corner, seeking shelter as she was. His face was hidden in the gloom, but he seemed familiar.

Neville could only see her in silhouette, the storm reducing the light to a gloomy dusk. He saw her observing him, relaxed but alert. He recognised the posture; she had been through the same things as him. A guard was never dropped until you were certain; it had become a habit now.

_Then her cheek was pale and thinner than should be for one so young,_

_And her eyes on all my motions with a mute observance hung._

A crack of lightning made her flinch but illuminated her face for just long enough.

'Hannah? I didn't…' the rest of his words were lost as the thunder rolled and the rain came down harder. It now looked like a wall of water, trapping them in their shelter. She shook her head to indicate she had not heard.

'I didn't recognise you, at first,' he repeated

'You know me?'

He realised he was in deeper shadow and stepped forward, slowly.

'Neville Longbottom? What brings you here on a Sunday afternoon?'

How did he answer that question? The truth was too honest at times.

_Truth, for Truth is Truth, he worshipt, being true as he was brave;_

_Good, for Good is Good, he follow'd, yet he look'd beyond the grave,_

'I have to be somewhere, and here is a good a place as any. You?'

'The same.'

'I've not seen you since…How have you been?'

'You don't want to know.'

'Yes, I know.'

She stared at the torrent before them. 'We were meant to be the winners, weren't we?'

'So they told us.'

_For I dipt into the future, far as human eye could see,_

_Saw the Vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be;_

'I wonder what went wrong?'

'Do you want to talk about it?'

'I have to work tonight, in The Leaky Cauldron. It probably won't be busy though, with this weather.'

'I have to go home, for my dinner.'

'Oh.'

'I could come back, afterwards.'

She smiled, just slightly. 'I'd like that. A chance to talk. You're not seeing friends tonight?'

'No. Not tonight.'

Silence came upon them and they turned to watch the storm as it faded into the distance. The flashes moved towards the far horizon and the thunder came to them sounding like an old man's grumbles.

'Hannah, I don't see anyone from the old days. Not really. There are…issues.'

'Yeah, same here. We make a proper couple, don't we?'

Their eye met properly for the first time, and the words took on a new meaning.

'Perhaps. I could floo my Gran, tell her I won't be home.'

'It'll be warmer inside, if you wanted to come back now.'

_Not in vain the distance beacons. Forward, forward let us range,_

_Let the great world spin for ever down the ringing grooves of change._

_Forward, let the stormy moment fly and mingle with the Past._

_I that loathed, have come to love him. Love will conquer at the last._

_-Fin-_


End file.
